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WASHINGTON — Evoking the U.S. shuttle diplomacy of decades past, Secretary of State John Kerry
is making his third trip to the Middle East in a span of just two weeks in a fresh bid to restart
long-stalled peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

Though expectations are low for any breakthrough on Kerry’s trip, which begins on Saturday, his
meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders represent some of the Obama administration’s
most-sustained efforts at engagement in a region that has frustrated American administrations for
six decades.

“His diplomacy will be based on what he hears from the parties,” State Department spokeswoman
Victoria Nuland said yesterday. Kerry, she said, will be making clear that both sides have to want
to get back to the negotiating table “and that they’ve also got to recognize — both parties — that
compromises and sacrifices are going to have to be made if we’re going to be able to help.”

Kerry had planned to leave on Monday for talks in London and then South Korea, China and Japan.
But officials said he moved up his departure to Saturday for a first stop in Turkey. There he’ll
seek to build on recent efforts by that nation and Israel to repair ties and coordinate on stemming
violence in Syria.Kerry then travels to Jerusalem and to Ramallah in the West Bank, which he
visited with Obama last month before returning to Israel a second time.

U.S. officials say Kerry is primarily interested in gauging what the Israelis and the
Palestinians are willing to do to restart direct negotiations that have been mostly frozen for the
past 41/2 years. He’ll meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian
President Mahmoud Abbas.